ap«U ° f ten extravagant and noify; and fometimes tlieir ideas were
fo original as to give great amufement. We had a very
weak fcorbutic patient when we arrived at Taheitee: this
man being fomewhat recovered by means of frefh vegetable
food, and animated by the example of the crew, wooed a
Taheitian g ir l; about dulk led her to his birth, and lighted
a candle. She looked her lover in the face, and finding he
had loft one eye, (he took him by the hand, and conduced
him upon deck again to a girl that was one-eyed likewife*.
giving him to underftand, that that perfon was a fit partner
for him, but that for her part fhe did not choofe to put up-
with a blind lover.
May Two days after, my father, being in fome meafure reco-
Sunday i. vered from the fatigue of his late excurfion, and from the
bruife which he had received, went on fhore, and found
there o-Rettee, the chief of o-Hiddea, a diftridt and harbour
where M. de Bougainville lay at anchor. This chief afked
captain Cook, whether, on his return to England, he fhould
fee M. de Bougainville, whom he called Potavirree ; and.
being anfwered in the negative, he put the fame queftion
to my father. He replied, it was not impoflible, though he
lived in a different kingdom, | Then,’’ faid o-Rettee, “ tell
him I am his friend, and long to fee him again at o-Ta-
heitee ; and in order that you may remember it, I will give
you a hog as foon as I return from my diftridt, to which
I am now going,” With that he began to relate, that his.
friend
friend Mi de Bougainville had had two fhips, and that on -'m-
board of one there was a woman, but that fhe was ugly.
He refted a long while on this circumftance, and feemed to
think it extraordinary that a fingle woman fhould go on
fuch an expedition. He likewife confirmed the account of
a vifit from a Spanifh fhip, which we had learned during
our firft ftay at Taheitee ; but he allured us that he and his
countrymen had no great affedlion for them. O-Rettee was
a fine grey-headed man, but very healthy and vigorous, as
the old people of Taheitee in general feem to be ; his countenance
was the pidture of a lively, chearful, and generous
man. He told us he had been; in many battles, and fhewed
us feveral wounds he had received, particularly a blow with
a ftone on his temple, which had left a deep fear. He had
fought by Tootahah’s fide, on the.day when that chief, was
killed.
The next morning Dr. Sparrman went with me up the Monday a*
valley of Matavai, which the natives call T o o a o o r o o . This
was the firft excurfion of any length which I undertook
after my illnefs : I was therefore highly delighted with the
beautiful appearance of the vegetable creation, which had
been revived by the late rainy feafon ; and furprifed at the
vaft improvements which I faw throughout the whole dif-
tridl. Wherever I went, I faw new and extenfive plantations,
in excellent order; I found numbers of new houfes ‘
built, and the natives at work upon new canoes in many
places*